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iNDIAN CORN, 



BY 



E. LEWIS STURTEVANT, M. D., 



SOUTH FRAMINGHAM, MASS, 



[ Rteprinte<1 from the Thirty^eighth Annual Report of the N. j w Fork State AgrieM 

tural Society. 1878.1 



ALBANY: 

CHARLES VAX BENTBUYSEN .V ><>ns 

1880. 



INDIAN CORN, 



BY 



E/ LEWIS STURTEVANT, M. D., 



SOUTH FRAMINGHAM, MASS. 



[Reprinted from the Thirty-eighth Annual Report of the New York State Agricul- 
tural Society, 1878.1 



ALBANY: 

CHARLES VAN BENTHUYSEN & SONS. 
1880. 



Itl Exchange 
YaA© Univ. Lib. 
18 Mr UO/ 






5 

\ 

H 



INDIAN CORN, 



E. LEWIS STURTEVANT, M. D., 



SOUTH FRAMINGHAM, MASS. 



[Paper presented by request at the Annual Meeting, January 22, 1879.] 



The interest which surrounds an investigation into the history of a 
cultivated plant, increases with the importance of the uses to which the 
vegetable is applied, and the obscurity which prevails over the origin. 
There is a delight in probing within mysteries, and in the following out 
of clues which trace to mythology and the beginnings of things, espe- 
cially when the value of the production lends a factitious dignity to every- 
thing connected with the investigation, and the fancy can play without 
the appearance of triviality, or the accusation of idle research. The 
corn plant eminently holds this relation to the student, as furnishing 
support to so many people of diverse nationalities, being cultivated in 
nearly every region of the globe, and furnishing to commerce such an 
important increment. In the year 1877, the product of Indian corn is 
given for the United States alone as 1,342,588,000 bushels, representing 
a value of §480,643,400. To move this crop at one time would require 
3,759,162 cars, which would occupy at least 30,000 riviles of track. As an 
actual fact, of this immense crop, 70,860,983 bushels were'exported, con- 
stituting a greater value than any other one exported product save cot- 
ton and bacon alone. 

Botany. 

Indian Corn, the Zea 3 fays of botanists, is an annual plant of the 
order of grasses, characterized by its monoecious flowers, the male borne 
in a terminal panicle ; the spikelet two flowered. The female flowers aie 



borne in an axillary spike, and are enveloped in a number of leaf sheaths 
which answer to floral envelopes. There are very many, in fact, innu- 
merable varieties, caused by climate, selection, cross-fertilization and 
cultivation. The plant may vary in its varieties, under certain condi- 
tions, from two feet to fourteen feet or more in height ; it may contain 
a different number of nodes ; it may normally develop ears from dif- 
ferent nodes in different varieties ; it is subject to variation, between 
varieties, of leaf, size aud number ; some are more prolific than others ; 
the maturity of varieties may vary from ninety to one hundred and 
twenty days, etc. We also find variations in the characters of the seed 
and ear. Some bear short, others long ears ; some ovoid, others tapering 
ears; some eight-rowed, others ten, twelve, sixteen, twenty, and even 
up to twenty-four and thirty-six rowed ears ; some of the kernels are 
globular, others ovoid, others cone-shaped, some broader than long, oth- 
ers longer than broad, some narrow, others deep ; these kernels may be 
flattened, pointed, toothed, indented, wrinkled or smooth. In color of 
kernel we have variations from pearl white, white, dusky, pale yellow, 
yellow, orange, copper-colored, red, purple, slate, black, and even varie- 
gated. In size one variety may produce a grain seven or eight times 
heavier than that from another variety. In the arrangement of the 
structural portions of the kernel, we find variations from the pop-corn at 
one extreme, wherein the oil is visibly distributed throughout the whole 
mass, through -varieties wherein there is visible starchy matter between 
the chit and the common oily portion, to kernels wherein there is no 
appearance of oil. We find the grain of some varieties hard, of others 
softer; in still others a granular structure, and in sweet corn nearly 
gummy as taken from the plant at time of harvest, etc: And these 
and many other distinctions are characteristic of varieties, and are in the 
main transmitted with considerable constancy through the seed. 

Within a variety we notice a facility of sporting which is remarkable. 
Through the influence of foreign pollen, the cob may bear kernels hav- 
ing every appearance of the variety which furnishes the pollen, as well 
as other kernels of intermediate color, shape and qualities. Grain may 
be borne on the tassel or staminiferous plume, and the stamens may 
appear on the cob, or the plume may be converted into an ear, and the 
ear into a tassel, although usually the two characters are combined in 
these cases. The plant may vary in its habit of growth, and become 
what is called branched ; the ear may develop at nodes where it does 
not normally belong; the nodes, from which normally but a single ear 
proceeds, may bear two ears, or even in two cases we have observed, foiir 
ears have appeared at the upper node, which is normally barren of fruit ; 
the cobs may produce a tassel of staminiferous bloom from their apex, 
the grain being found as usual in the basal portion ; the ears may 
branch at their base, forming two, three, or even six ears ; the branches 
may produce a terminal ear, and at the same time develop ears from 
their nodes, as we have in our collection three nodal and one terminal 
ear on a branch. The kernel also is subject to change of shape, and to 
change of structure. We have observed flint varieties rounded and 
dented, both kinds in the same cob, and produced without any apparent 
aid from cross-fertilization from a dent variety (1). 

(1) We mention, as a matter of interest, that in one variety, at least, wherein the spikelet on 
the panicle bears one pediciled and one sessile ilower.it has always, withjn our observation, 

been the sessile flower which has sported into a grain-producing organ, while the pediciled 



Bibliography. 

The only books or essays on corn we have met with, or seen mentioned, 
worthy of record, are included in the list as given below. We here men- 
tion that, in our references to authorities in other than the English or 
French languages, we have been compelled to trust 10 others, but in 
every case material is furnished by whose aid can be readily seen who 
is to vouch for the authorities : 

An Essay on Indian Corn. By P. A. Browne, 8°, Phila., 1837. 
Memoir on Indian Corn. By D. J. Browne, New York, 1856. 
Treatise on Indian Corn. By Edward Enfield, 12°, New York, 1866. 
Essays. P. A. Browne. Farmer's Cabinet, 1837. 

D. J. Browne. Trans, of Am. Institute, 1846. 

H. Carl Heller. U. S. Pat. of Rept., 1847. 

J. H. Salisbury. Trans. N. Y. Agr. Soc., 1848. 

C. L. Flint. ib. 1849. 

C. N. Bement. ib. 1853. 

F. Brendel. Trans. 111. State Agr. Soc, 1856-7. 

J. H. Klippart. Agr. of 0., 1858. 

C. L. Flint. Agr. of Mass., 1858. 

W. C. Flagg. Trans. Dept. of Agr. of 111., 1872. 
Facts for Farmers. Maize, its Culture and Uses. London. 
Cobbett, Wm. A Treatise on Indian Corn, 12", London, 1828. 
Darwin, Charles. Animals and Plants under Domestication, chap. ix. 
Amoureux. Memoire sur le mais, J 784. 
Parmentier. A work on maize, 1785. 
Duchesne, E. A. Traite du mais, 8", Paris, 1833. 
Bonafous. Nat. Hist, du mais, folio, Turin and Paris, 1836. 
Burger. Natural History and Culture, 1809. 
Metzger. Die G-etreidearten. 

Harasti. A Practical Treatise on the Culture of Maize, 1788. 
See, also, the following references in addition to those others that will 
occur in our text : 

Alph. de Canclolle. Geograph. Bot., p. 942 ; Silliman's Journal, vol. 
xliv; Teschemacher in Proc, Bost. Soc. Nat, Hist., Oct. 19, 1842; God- 
rou, de 1' Espece, torn, ii ; Scott, J., Trans. Bot. Soc. of Edinb. ; P. Kalm, 
Swedish acts, vol. iv, etc. 

Synonyms. 
As a matter of course, Indian corn has received various names in the 
different countries where it has been cultivated. We have collected the 
following : 

Abyssinia Mashela bah-ry, Millet from the sea, (Parkyns). 

Aztec Thaolli (Humboldt). 

Bel ^ { SSchkoorn,}( S:llisb ^- 



flower has resisted 1 lie change. When the plume is all ovary producing, then there have been no 
pediciled flowers. In those cases of the staminiferous tlower occurring in the cob, it has always 
been the normally undeveloped or abortive flower which has produced stamens. This tact would 
suggest an affinity with the sorghums, sufficient at least to warrant the hypothesis (supported as 
well by other facts of observation) that the maize and sorghum have been derived from one 
parent species, in the distant past, and that the sorghums of Africa and the Zea of America are 
hut the same plant as changed by a different line of evolution. This hearing of grain in the 
tassel is certainly hereditary, and, in the fields we have studied, is accompanied by correlative 
barrenness at the nudes, or a tendency thereto, etc. This, be it understood, is not advanced as a 
theory, but as a hypothesis, which tends to clear up certain obscurities. 



Burmah Pyoung-boo, (Mason). 

r ., ( Milho, (Treas. of Bot.). 

131 az11 t Maiz, (Niewhoff, 1647). 

p, • ( La-chou-cha, (Flint). 

( Yii-shu-shu, (Bretschneider). 

Ceylon Muwa, (Moon). 

Dardanelles Reed wheat, (Forskal). 

East Indian archipelago.. Jagun<j, or "Indigenous," (Crawford), 

■p , C Dourah of Syria, (Klippart). 

°'P ' ( Donra shammy, Syria Millet, (Parkyns). 

English I Maize, 

" ( Indian corn. 

-c, ( Le mais, ) /T i % 

b ranee < T >^ , m • t (Loudon). 

( Ble de Turquie, ) v ' 

j Ble de Espagne, ) jo-w-v "i 

t Ble de Indie, J (Salisbury). 

C Wheat of Rome, in Lorraine and Vosges, "} 

" \ Wheat of Guinea, ) . p rovence \ (Klippart). 

( Wheat of Barbary, f 1 ) 

Germany i Der Ma y s ' < Loudon )- 

3 " \ Turkischer koorn, (Salisbury). 

Greece, Athens Arabian corn, (Sibthorp). 

Haytian Mahiz, (Gomara). 

Hindustan Mnk Jawarree-boota, (Graham). 

j ,. ( Makkai, (Dutt). 

lnaia "\ Moka, (Treas. of Bot.). 

fLenni Lenapi ... Lenchesquem, (D. J. Browne). 

I d' J Quonnectiquot . . Wiachin, (Winthrop). 

] Coosaws Mayze, (Flint). 

l^New England... Eat chumnis, (Wood). 
Gran Turco, (Loudon). 



C Gran lurco, (Loudon). 

Ital y j £rano % I " dia ' \ (Salisbury). 

t. Grano Sicnano, ) v J ' 

i 
i 



Nanbamthbi, (Heller). 

Japan -J Sjo Kuso, (Kaempfer). 

f. Too Kibbi, (Thunberg). 

Malays Jagong, (Treas. of Bot.). 

C Mayz, (Inca Garcilasso de la Vega). 

Mexico \ Centli, (Flint). 

(. Tluolli, (Clavigero). 

( one variety Cara, ~\ 

Peru .< another variety. . Muruchu, > (Flint). 

t another variety. . Capia, ) 

Pekin, China Yii-mi, Jade corn, (Bretschneider). 

Persia Ghendum i Mekka, wheat from Mecca, (Bretschneider). 

t>~ + i ( Milho da India, ) /t , v , N 

Po1 tu ^ al { Milho grande, } (Salisbury). 

Quichua Cara, (Flint). 

Russia Tureskorichljeb, (Salisbury). 

Sennaar Eysh reef, Egyptian Millet, (Parkyns). 

t { oUZtV^}^^- 

r Maiz, (London). 

Spain < Trigo de Tnrkuia, (Flint). 

i Zara, (Treas. of Bot.). 

Sweden { ^ ish hvede > } (Salisbury). 

Turkey Misrbogdag, or wheat of Egypt, (Klippart). 

West Indies ( mT^Vi V& k1 Y ' (A ° 0Sti) - 

( Mahiz, (Colombo). 



I. AMERICAN HISTORY. 

Antiquity of its Culture. 

The mere fact of the great variability of the corn-plant, and its pli- 
ancy of habit which has given it an adaptiveness to so many regions of 
varying climate, is sufficient evidence of the antiquity of its culture ; 
and, we might add, that it is uncertain whether any truly wild variety 
is known to exist, as, to say the least, there seems no evidence that the 
so-called wild varieties are other than cultivated varieties escaped from 
cultivation. A peculiar kind, in which each grain, instead of being 
naked, is concealed by a husk, has been stated, on insufficient evidence, 
as Darwin(2) observes, to grow wild in Brazil ; but Professor Gray states 
that this species produces from its seeds either the common or the husked 
maize. A cut of the so-called wild corn, said to be found growing " in 
the Rocky Mountains of North America, and down to the humid forests 
of Paraguay," is to be found in the United States Patent Office Report 
for 1853 (page 98), and another cut, evidently of a different variety, 
under the name of Oregon, California, or wild corn, said to have been 
introduced from Oregon, California, Mexico and South America, is given 
in Agriculture of Ohio, 1858 (page 524), and these cuts would seem to 
indicate a variability scarcely consistent with the claim of a species for 
the two. 

When the fact is taken into consideration, that those plants which are 
the most sportive in cultivation are apt to be those whose origin is known 
tc extend to a very remote antiquity, and which have become fitted 
through their adaptiveness of character to conditions of culture in 
regions far apart and dissimilar in climate, we are prepared to grant 
that the probabilities of corn being a most anciently cultivated plant 
are very strong, and we, for our part, should not anticipate the corn- 
plant ever being found truly wild, as we must believe that it has been 
modified so greatly from its original source as not to secure usual recog- 
nition. Indeed, we know from our own experiments, that the removal 
of acorn-plant from the normal conditions by mechanical cultivation about 
the growing plant alone, increases the tendency of the plant to vary, 
and is productive even in one generation, of a manifest departure from 
the type of the variety planted ; and we believe we have noticed indica- 
tions of changes which would lead to the inference that by a systematic 
planting of seed selected for its pure quality, a few generations of culture 
would secure differences as great as now exist between the so-called 
wild corn and the cultivated varieties. 

Be this as it may, we have absolute evidence of the culture of corn 
in America extending beyond the historical period, in the charred corn- 
cobs, which have been taken from Indian mounds ;(3) in the corn itself, 
two varieties of which were taken from tombs in Peru, apparently prior 
to the dynasty of the Incas,(4) while Darwin(5) relates that in the 



(2) Darwin An. and PI., under Domes, N. Y., 1868, i. 3S6. 

(3) U. s. Dept. Ag. Kept., 1870, p. 420. 

(4) Tscbudi. Travels in Peru. Eiitf. Trans., p. 177. 

(5) Voyage of a Naturalist. Harper's ed., 1859, ii, p. 117. 



8 

northern part of Chili, within the Cordilleras, heads of Indian corn are 
not unfreqnently upturned in digging among the ruins of the old Indian 
houses in places where the modern inhabitants do not abide ; still more 
emphatic is the evidence of antiquity in the finding of the head of a 
stalk of Indian corn identical in appearance with similar relics taken 
from out of the Huacas or old Peruvian tombs, embedded amidst the 
shells and much-drifted sea-rubbish on a terrace eighty-five feet above 
the sea,(6) occurring with bits of cotton thread and plaited rush. Were 
further evidence required, it may be found in an ear of corn(7) in the 
possession of the Smithsonian Institution, found deposited in an eartheru 
vessel eleven feet under ground, in a grave with a mummy, near Are- 
quipi, in Peru. 

A most striking observation in regard to this last-mentioned ear of 
corn is that the grain is irregularly disposed on the cob in thirteen rows, 
suggesting the thought that at this early period the habit of the corn- 
plant in bearing rows in a number always divisible by two, had not as 
yet become so strongly fixed as at present. (8) We would also impress 
attention to the circumstance that two varieties are mentioned as being 
found by Tschudi. Goncalo Ximenez, in describing the Corn of New 
Granada, speaks of two varieties, a coarse and a fine, the latter called 
niorocho. Jos. de Acosti, in his natural history of the West Indies, says, 
there are two sorts, one large and substantia], the other small and dry, 
which they call morochi. The Inca Garcilasso de la Vega, in treating 
of the products of Peru, mentions two sorts, one called moruchu, which 
is hard, and the other capia, which is tender and fine. Clavigero, in 
describing the grains of Mexico, says the Indians had several varieties, 
the large and the small sorts, the white, the yellow, the blue and the 
black. The corn at present cultivated about the Pueblas of New Mexico 
and Arizona, now as formerly, varies in color through shades of pink, 
blue and white. In his account of the Indians given to the Royal 
Society, of which he was a member, Mr. Winthrop says the corn is of 
various colors, such as red, white, yellow, blue, olive, greenish-black, 
speckled, striped, sometimes in the same field and in the same ear ; Hig- 
ginson, in New England's Plantation, says also of corn, that there are of 
" varietie of colours — as red, blew and yellow, etc." Josselyn'also says, 
" Indian wheat, of which there is three sorts — yellow, red and blew. 
The blew is commonly ripe before the other" (Rarefies, p. 83); and 
this for the Indians of the Northeastern America. A distinct variety 
noted for its earliness was cultivated by the Mandans of the northwest; 
other and distinct varieties by the Indians of New York, and the Caro- 
linas, etc. 

According to Flint,(9) at the old ruins of Copa% and Central America, 
are found paintings and statuary ornaments of maize and De Candolle, 
also states that a variety of maize has been found on an ancient Peruvian 



(0) Darwin, ib. ii, p. 135. 

(7) U. S. Dept. Ag. Kept., 1870, p. 120, where it is frequent. Sec, also, Lapham's Antiquities of 
Wisconsin, for reason to think corn was cultivated by a race preceding the Indians. 

(S) We examined an ear of mummy corn, December, 1878, which was in the possession of 
Professor Goodale, "of Harvard University The grains were irregularly ananged upon the 
cob, somewhat spirally, and of uncertain count. \Ve made fifteen, fifteen and seventeen rows 
(odd numbers, observe) in three different counts on different segments of the car, but on account 
of the irregular arrangement, we could not convince ourselves whether this was an actual or 
but a seeming' fact. The kernel differed in shape from our common varieties no more than our 
varieties differ among themselves. 

(!)) Agr. Of. Mass., 1858, p. 52. 



9 

sculpture. Less certain evidence is in the stone pestles, which are dug 
up from Indian haunts, and from the mound regions of the west.(lO) 

When the early voyagers reached the shores of America, they found 
the corn-plant widely distributed, and under cultivation by the aborigines, 
who, indeed, gave lessons for its growing to the European Colonists. (11) 
Columbus found it on the Island of Cuba and other points ;. Vasco Nunez, 
in Guiana; Navarez and De Soto, in Florida; and Goncalo Ximenez, in 
New Granada, the latter of whom says that it furnished the principal 
food of the inhabitants, and bore very large and weighty spikes or ears, 
each generally yielding 700 grains, a bushel of which, when planted 
in warm moist land, frequently produced 800 fold; (12) others of 
the earlier historians and writers, as P. Martyr, (13) Ercilla, (14) Jean 
de Levy, (15) and Torquemada,(16) tell us that the first Europeans who 
set foot on the New World saw the maize. Bernal Diaz,(17) the author of 
" Conquest of Mexico " says " the country produces maize, red pepper, 
and many other things." Garcilasso de la Vega, one of the earliest Peru- 
vian historians says, that the palace gardens of the Incas were orna- 
mente 1 with maize in gold and silver, with all the grains, stalks, spikes 
and leaves, and in one instance we are told that there was in " the gar- 
dens of gold and silver," an entire corn-field of considerable size, repre- 
senting the maize in its erect and natural shape. (18) 

Our Puritan fathers found corn in abundance on the New England 
coast, wherever they landed (19). The Sieur deChamplain in naviga- 
ting along the coast found cultivated corn-fields in 1605, at the mouth 
of the Kennebec river in Maine, at Cape Cod, and " much land well 
tilled in corn " farther south. When Cartier visited Hochelaga, near 
Montreal, in 1535, he found that town situated in the midst of extensive 
corn-fields (20). The Five Nations made planting of corn their business 
before the French arrived in Canada, in 1603 (21). At first the Swed- 
ish settlements at New* Jersey and Pennsylvania were obliged to buy 
maize of the Indians for sowing and eating, as Kalm writes, and Indian 
corn was also found as a common food, when Europeans first landed at 
New York (20). It was cultivated in extensive fields there as well as 
inland, as the French army under Frontenac, in 1696, spent three days 
in August destroying the growing corn of the Onondagas (22h Corn 
was also found in cultivation by the Indians about James river in 1607, 
when the colonists sent over by the " London Company " took lessons 
from them of its culture, the first attempt by Europeans that we find 
recorded (23). 

We have thus far referred to the periods since the discovery by Co- 



(10) Sec Smith. Reports, Passim. 

(11) U. S. Pal. Of. Kept. 1853, p. 98. Oilier authorities could be given 

(12) D. J. Browne, quoted Trans. N. Y. Ag. Soe. 18-18, p. 681. See also, Alvar Nunez Cabeca 
de Vaea, Relation ; Disc, and Conquest of Florida by De Soto ; F. Colombo, in Hakluvt's 
Voyages, etc. 

(13) De Orbe novo de decades, 1516, iii. (14) Alonzo de Ercilla, Araucana, Madrid, 1577. 

(15) Historia d'un voyage fait en la terre du Bresil. 172.'5. 

(16) Delia Monarquia Indiana, loin, i, 158. (17) Writing some fifty years after the Conquest. 
(is) Prescott gives as authorities: 

Garcilasso. Cum. Kejil pi 1. lib! 5, Cap. 2(5 ; Lib. 6, Cap. 2. Also Sarmento, Relacion Ms. Cap. 
24. Cieza de Leon, Cronica, Cap. 04. 

(lit) Morton New England's Memorials. Boston, 1826, 68. Gooken, Mass., Hist. Collections, 
chap, iii See also Bradford Hist. Plym. Plant. 82,100. Mourt's Relation; Wood, New Lug. 
Prospects; Roger Williams' Kev, etc. 

(20) John Delalield, Trans X.'Y Ag. Soc. 1850,386 

(■21) Colden's Hist, of the Five Nations, London. 1747. (22) Doc Hist. New York, i, 212. 

(23) U. s. Pat. Of. Rept. 185!. its Jefferson's notes on Virginia. See for cultui e in Louisiana. 
Dn Pratz's Hist, de la Louisiana; Paris. I7js, ii. i7;'>. In Colorado's, Castanedo's Relations, (in 
1540). Cabeca de Vega's Relation, 1528-1536 lor Florida, Texas, etc. In New England, Young's 
Chronicles of the Pilgrims. 231. 



10 

lumbus, and to monumental records. We might increase our references 
quite readily, as we have by no means exhausted our material. More 
interesting and important however, are the pre-Columbian mention. 
Thus in 1002, Rai'n, sailing from Greenland, westward, Thorwald, 
brother of Lief, reached the wintering place in Vinland. The following 
season, on an island far westward, "met with a wooden Kornhjalmr" 
(corn shed ?), but saw no other signs of inhabitants (Pickering). In 
100(3, Karlsefne sent out two Scots people to explore on the coast of 
Massachusetts (?), when they returned they brought back a bunch of 
grapes aud a new so wen ear of wheat. (23') At Hop, supposed by 
Prof. Rafn to be in the vicinity of Taunton, Mass., " they found there 
upon the land self-sown fields of wheat, there, where the ground was 
low, but vines there where it rose somewhat."(23") In or about A.D. 
1250, in the reign of Nopaltzin, King of the Chichimecs, the culture of 
maize and the art of making bread, long neglected and in danger of 
being lost, was revived by a Toltec named Xinhtlato (Humboldt. Atl. Pict.). 
As corroboratives to the Icelandic Sagas, we find Adam of Bremen, in 
the 11th century, citing corn as growing in America to perfection. (23'") 

Mythology. 

Were we unacquainted with any of these facts, yet would we have 
evidence of its ancient cultivation, and a hold upon the American abori- 
gines which it must have taken time to secure, in the sacred associa- 
tions which were connected by them with it. Not only was it a sign in 
the calendar .among the ancient Mexicans, and a holy ornament upon 
their graves (24), but they had a goddess who presided over this pro- 
duction, who was called To-na-cay-ohn-a which means " she who feeds 
us." To her they consecrated the first fruits of the earth as the heathens 
did to Ceres (25). 

Other authors name the goddess Cinteute, and state that she derived 
her name from that of maize, " Cintli," and received the first offerings 
of the maize harvest (26). We also learn (27) that a tradition existed 
that when the beneficent god Quetzalcoatl, the god of the air, resided 
upon the earth, the land teemed with fruit and flowers, without the 
pains of culture, and that an ear of corn was as much as a man 
could carry. 

The Peruvians, as well, introduced maize into their religious festivals. 
During the high feast Capacraqui, held in the first month, Ray mi, agree- 
ing with our December, no stranger was supposed to lodge in Cuzco, to 
which they again all assembled as soon as the festival was over, to 
receive cakes made of maize, etc. In the beginning of the month 
Hatanctizqui, which corresponds to our May, the Peruvians gathered 
their maize, and kept the feast Aymorai. They returned home, singing 
from the fields, carrying with them a large heap of maize, which they 
called Perna, wrapping it up in rich garments. They continued th<\se 
ceremonies for three nights, imploring the Perua to preserve their har- 
vest of maize from any danger, etc. (28.) The corn-stalks with many 

(-23' 1 Voyages of the Northmen to America. Prince Soc, Pub , p. 51. (23") lb., 54. 

W") In Coiiciihiii/i'ii. Nord oldskr. Selsk. Antiq. Amer., 1847. 
(•24) H. Carf Heller U. s. Pat. Of. Kept. 1847, 411. 

(25) Jos. tie Acosti's N:it. Hist, of the West Indies, lib. 4, chap. 16, p. 236, quoted in Trans. 
N. Y. Agr. Soc. 1848. 68-2. 
(-261 J. Breniiul. Trans. Ill Agr. Soc. 1S56-7, 47a. 
127) Prcscott's Conquest of Mexico, i, 59 
(2S) 1). J. Browne, quoted in Trans. N. Y. Agr Soe. 1818, 690, 



11 

ears or with double ears were considered by the ancient Peruvians as 
sacred things, but not as deities ; they were called by the Indians 
Huantazara or Aryhuazara, because they danced with them the dance 
Afihuay when the corn was suspended by branches of willow; in the 
same way did they worship the ears, the grains of which were of various 
colors, or were arranged in rows united in the shape of a cone.(2S ) 

The North American Indians have also their traditions concerning its 
origin, not unmixed with mythological interest. The Western Indians 
believe that on a certain occasion the Great Spirit descended to the earth 
in the form of a beautiful squaw, and that when she first touched the 
ground with her feet, there sprang up the Indian corn. Another tradi- 
tion is that the first grain of corn was brought to them by a black bird. 
The most beautiful of them, however, is that of the Odjibwas, which, 
as given by Mr. Schoolcraft, deserves a full quotation : 

"A young man went out into the woods to fast at the period of life 
when youth is exchanged for manhood. He built a lodge of b ughs in 
a secluded place, and painted his face of a sombre hue. By day he 
amused himself in walking about, looking at the various shrubs and 
wild plants, and at night he lay down in his bower, which, being open, 
he could look up into the sky. He sought a gift from the Master of 
Life, and he hoped it would be something to benefit his race. On the 
third day he became too weak to leave the lodge, and, as he lay gazing 
upwards, he saw a spirit come down in the shape of a beautiful young 
man, dressed in green, and having green plumes on his head, who told 
him to arise and wrestle with him, as this was the only way in which he 
could obtain his wishes. He did so, and found his strength renewed by 
the effort. This visit and the trial of wrestling were repeated for four 
days, the youth feeling at each trial that, although his bodily strength 
declined, a moral and supernatural energy was imparted which promised 
him the final victory. On .the sixth day his celestial visitor spoke to him. 
' To-morrow,' said he, ' will be the seventh day of your fast, and the last 
time I shall wrestle with you. You will triumph over me and gain your 
wishes. As soon as you have thrown me down, strip off' my clothes, and 
bury me in the spot, in soft, fresh earth. When you have done this, 
leave me, but come occasionally to visit the place to keep the weeds from 
growing. Once or twice coyer me w r ith fresh earth.' He then departed, 
but returned the next day, and, as he had predicted, was thrown down. 
The young man punctually obeyed his instructions in every particular, 
and soon had the pleasure of seeing the green plumes of his sky-visitor 
shooting up through the ground. He carefully weeded the earth and 
kept it fresh and soft, and in due time was gratified by beholding the 
matured plant bending with its yellow fruit, and gracefully waving its 
green leaves and yellow tassels in the wind. He then invited his 
parents to the spot, to behold the new plant. ' It is mondamin,' replied 
his father, ' it is the spirit grain.' They immediately prepared a feast, 
and invited their friends to partake of it, and this is the. origin of In- 
dian corn." (29) In speaking of the Indians of New England, Roger 
Williams writes that they have a tradition " that the crow brought them 
at first an Indian grain of corn in one eare, and an Indian or French 
beane in another, from the great God Kautantouwits field in the south- 
west, from whence they hold, came all their corne and beanes."(29') 

(28') Rivers and Tschudi, Peruvian Aniiq., 172. 

(29). See Longfellow's beautiful versification of this storyin "Hiawatha," Canto V, entitled, 
Hiawatha's Fasting. Rend, also, in continuance Canto XIII, Blessing the Corn Fields. 
(.29) Key to the Language of Am., Lond., 1(315. Nnrragansett Club Ed, p. 141. 



12 

II. EUROPEAN HISTORY. 

There is a certain significance in language to trivial names, and hence 
it may not be out of place, in studying the European aspect of the his- 
tory of corn, to see whether, in the popular terms, we cannot obtain a 
clue to the direction of its distribution. We must bear in mind the 
danger of this course leading us into error, if we ask more of it than this* 

Noth withstanding Gerard, after describing in his " Herbal " several 
kinds of Turkey wheat, evidently varieties of maize, goes oil to say that 
"these kinds of grain were first brought into Spain, and thence into the 
other provinces of Europe, not (as some suppose) out of Asia Minor, 
which is the Turks' dominions, but out of America and the islands adjoin- 
ing, as out of Florida and Virginia, or Novembega," etc. ; and notwith- 
standing M. E. Discourlitz says directly that maize was brought into 
Europe by the Spaniards from Peru, and Matthioli in 1645 affirms that 
Turkish wheat is not a proper name for maize, but that it should be 
called Indian wheat because it came from the West Indies, and not 
from Asia nor from Turkey ; notwithstanding these and other statements 
to like effect, the Turkish possessions seem to have given name to 
maize in many different countries. Thus, the common name not only 
in Spain, but as well in Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, 
Russia, Sicily and Sweden, would indicate that it was received from 
the Turkish provinces ; we would also infer that Italy received it from 
Sicily and American or West Indian derived seed as well ; France from 
West Indian, Spanish. Italian and Nothern African sources ; Sicily from 
seed derived from America as well as Turkey ; Central Africa from 
Egypt. Curiously enough, after this list, Turkey seems to refer back 
to Egypt for her supply ; Egypt, according toDelile, has a tradition that 
the plant was received from the north by the way of Syria and Turkey, 
and Portugal alone of European countries would seem to have derived 
her seed from the West Indies in a manner which impressed the name of 
this locality as a proper one for distinguishing this cereal. From this 
list, the only certain conclusion that we can draw is,* that Indian corn 
reached Northern and Central Europe, perhaps Southern Europe, through 
the countries bordering on the Mediterranean, but not probably from any 
one distinct center for this distribution; but whether these centers were 
Spain, or Asia Minor, or Africa, this method of investigation does not 
seem sufficient to furnish intelligible answer. Let us not fail to remem- 
ber, however, that all times are not equally propitious for the dispersion 
of seeds or commodities ; that some periods of the world's history are 
distinguished by conservatism and seclusion, are ages wherein social 
and physical barriers are everywhere to be found to hinder expansion, 
and intercommunication between adjoining districts, even if by chance 
a local activity should develop ; that there are other ages in which every 
nation seems brimming with that activity which leads to adventurous 
schemes, and which tends to distribute useful products over wide regions. 
Hence such a' useful cereal as corn might for a considerable space be 
confined for its knowledge and culture within a determinate locality, 
from whence under propitious circumstances, it might spread with a 
rapidity which history cannot follow. We see illustration of a parallel 
nature in the history of vegetables and fruit, which, although cultivated 
for long periods in certain portions of the world, are unknown in other 
neighboring regions until an Alexander, or some other less famous man, 
alike the product of a local activity and aggressiveness, breaks down 
barriers and carries his own restlessness to act. as a leaven throughout 



13 

adjoining regions. We see in the great wars of Greece and Persia, and 
in the Crusades, a means for civilization which acted to equalize the 

possessions of distant countries, and to convey between divers people a 
knowledge of foods and luxuries before unknown. As a conception 
merely, it is no more difficult to suppose that corn could have been con- 
fined in its culture to some local point in Asia or Africa, and that its 
dissemination should have been delayed for years or for centuries, than 
to suppose that the peach could have existed in Persia for an unknown 
period, without having passed into Europe, or that the cherry should 
have awaited the coming of a Lucullus before it left Pontus for Italy ; 
or to come to the present time, that mustard cress which occupies such 
a position in the London market, and which is so grateful to the English 
people, is not as yet classed among our market products. Difficult and 
easy to overcome, but who can foretell the habits, the tastes and 
the prejudices of a people, and hence, even, at the present day, the 
dissemination of new products for cultivation is considered the province 
of a government or of societies, so great the risk of failure and so small 
the chances for success. Had not circumstances given us the history of 
the potato, it might have logically been supposed to have existed for 
years, an obscure plant in gardens or fields, before its good qualities 
became recognized, and before it became distributed. Thus the potato 
is recorded to have been in cultivation in Peru in 1509,(30) and in the 
sixteenth century(ol) was so common in Italy as to be fed to animals, 
yet it was introduced into German cultivation really only in lb'50, did 
not get a hold in the field culture of England until 1684, and did not reach 
Scotland, where it is now so extensively grown, until the year 1728.(32) 
We cannot hence logically claim that corn must, have been immediately 
adopted into cultivation upon its discovery, and we must not accept The 
argument for its novelty, in its rapid extension during those years of 
activity, both national and individual, which coincide with and followed 
after the discovery of America by Columbus. (32) 

It would be curious, indeed, if the voyages of the old Northmen, which 
are now known to have extended to America, should have brought 
back samples of a grain which, unsuited to their climate, could scarcely 
have been preserved, and yet which might have secured a foothold in 
some favored locality bordering on the Mediterranean, and which only 
secured dissemination through the activity of communication, and re- 
vival of enterprise, which followed upon the discovery of the New World, 
when the minds of mankind were ripe for whatever was novel, and when 
old prejudices were being actively exchanged for new ones. We find 
Adam of Bremen, in the eleventh century, and Lief, in 1006, reaffirms 
this fact, citing corn growing in America to perfection, (33) and this was 
during the period of the surprising activity of the northern nations, 
whose people, as pirates or adventurers, had frequent communication 
with the Mediterranean coast, and when the Varangians held the keys for 
the Greek emperors at Constantinople, while others of these corsairs 
pressed forward into the west. 

(30) Acosta. Nat. and Moral Hist, of the Indies. Seville, 1509. 

(31) Bowles. Nat. Ili.^t of Spain. 

(32) M Drouhyn de Luhys. Address before the Society of Aclimatization. 1867. 

(3-2) For the necessity of these illustrations and observations, we can ruler, among others, to 
Prescott, who in his "'Conquest of Peru," writes: "The misnomer of Blfi de Turquie shows 
the popular errors. Yet the rapidity of its diffusion through Europe ami Asia, after the dis- 
covery of America, is of itself sufficient to show thai it could not have been indigenous to the 
Oli I World, ami have so long remained generally unknown to them." 

(33) Littell's Living Age, Dec. 10, 1873, p. 7«4; 'Voyages of the Northmen, Prince Soc. Pub. 



14 

Let us here collect the evidence which has been presented, as seeming 
to imply that Indian corn was known to the Old World prior to the voy- 
ages of Columbus. 

An old map, called the Chart of Incisa, of the thirteenth century, de- 
scribes a grain of a golden color, and partly white, under the name of 
meliga; and Crescenzio, a century before Columbus, describes the method 
of cultivating this grain, which is very nearly the same as that of culti- 
vating maize at the present day. On the authority of this map, many 
authors affirm that it came from the east, such as Sismondi,(34) M. 
Michaud,(35), Gregory,(36) Lonicer,(37) Amoreux,(38) Reynier,(39) and 
Darn. (40) A Portuguese writer, Sata Rozade Viterbo, (41) infers from a 
deed of the year 1289, that maize was known in Portugal. The deed 
read as follows : " Bequeathed to Stevan John of Perafita, or to his heirs, 
one quarter of milhoni." Crusaders are said to have brought, in 1204, 
from Asia Minor to Italy, a purse full of grains of a golden color, and 
partially white, which they called meliga, as we learn from the Chart of 
Incisa : now Cardan, (42) in the sixteenth century, says that the wheat 
cultivated in America, called maize, resembles in habit the plant called, 
in Italy, melica or sorghum ; and George de Turre, 1685, says that the 
maize, or Turkish wheat, imported since a few yearn in Italy, has a stalk 
resembling that of the metiga, or sorghum. (43) Bonafous informs us 
that, according to some Spanish authors, maize was brought into Spain 
by the Arabs. Bock, the first botanist who wrote of it forty years after 
the discovery of America, asserts that it came from Arabia.(44) Ruel- 
lius maintains the same opinion. (45) Fuchsius also declares that it 
came from Asia to Greece, thence to Germany. (46) 

We thus find that the investigations of many writers are in accordance 
with what we might infer from the vernacular names- applied to maize 
in the different countries. We also note that the date, 1204, is surprisingly 
close to that assigned to the restless activity of the Scandinavians. The 
Saga which furnishes a history of Northern Europe from about the time 
of the Christian Era to 1177, mentions Viking expeditions to all parts of 
the world, including the discovery of North America (47) ; in 986, the 
Northman Bjarni discovered the wooded portions of the American 
coast(48) ; in 1000, Erike wintered at Vinland, now supposed to have 
been in the vicinity of Rhode Island and Massachusetts ; and, according 
to another Saga, Karlsefne'g expedition to Vinland was in A. D. 1007. 
We also find evidence in a Runic inscription deciphered in Greenland, 
that communication with the American continent was continued till as 
late certainly as 1135. We have then for dates, the discovery and 
communications with the American coast from 986 A. D. to 1135 A. D., 
the presence of Northmen in Constantinople, in Russia and southern re- 
gions, and a spirit of enterprise pervading the sea and land from the 

(34) Biographie Universelle. Tom. xxix, 54-2, note. 

(3") Histoire desCJroisades (4tb ml., Paris, 1826), iii, 348-9. 

(36) Annates de 1' Agriculture Francais. 

(37) Naturalis Historian Opus Novum. Frankfort, 1551. 

(38) Memoir sur le Mais. 1784. 

(39) Feuille d' Agriculture du Canton de Vaud, vii. 
(401 Republic of Venice. 

(41) See Valcarel. Agric. Gen. y gobierno de la casa del campo. Valencia, 1768. 

(From 34 to 40, copied from Flint's Essay.) 
(4-2) De Subtilitate, lib. xxi, p. 389. Basle, 1553. 

(43) F. Brendel, Trans. 111. Ag: Soc. 1856-7, p. 471. 

(44) Bonafous Hist. Nat. du Mais, p. 11. 

(45) De Natura Stirpium, lib. xi, e, xxix, p. 428 [1536]. 

(46) De Histoiia Stirpium, 1542, pp. 8'24, 825. (47) Enc. Brit., 8th ed., xix, 690. 
(48) Enc. Brit., Hlli ed., xviii, 162. 



15 

Baltic to the Enxine for a few centuries preceding the Crusades (49), and 
the asserted introduction of meligaby Crusaders. These connections are 
not very close, nor are they sufficiently well defined to be claimed as his- 
tory, but they seem suggestive in the face of the certain existence of corn 
growing throughout America, its non-existence, or non-extension rather, 
through Europe until the discovery of Columbus in 1492, and the as- 
serted references to grain supposed to be corn, on insufficient evidence 
perhaps, but none of which precedes the voyages of the Northmen to 
America, and the known communication of the northern races with the 
inhabitants of the Mediterranean coasts. 

We could, unquestionably, find other references to a grain supposed 
to be maize, but we will content ourselves with but two : De Herbelet (50), 
the well-known Orientalist, mentions a passage of Mirkond, a Persian 
historian, which might lead us to suppose that mtdze was known to the 
Old World before the sailing of Columbus. Klippart (51), however, says 
that this passage does not refer to maize. " It relates that Khozar, sou 
of Japet, caused to be sown on Volga's banks (the region frequented by 
Northmen descendants, observe) some kaveres, a kind of corn, which 
the dictionaries render by millet, yellow millet, millet of Katay; 
and that Rous, Khozar's brother, caused to be cultivated on Volga's islands 
the borgon, which signifies, according to the same dictionaries, a kind of 
hollow tree from which flutes are made." The second author, who speaks 
decisively, is Rifaud, who, in his " Voyage en Egypt," etc., states that 
he found the " grains and ear of maize within the tomb of a mummy at 
Thebes, in 1819. M. Virey, however, in the Journal de Parmacie, shows 
that this grain called maize by M. Rifaud, was the sorghum bicolor, which, 
according to Delile, is a native of Egypt. "(52) 

It is of interest to note that one of the German sailors of Karlsefue, 
the year after the voyage, returned to Pomerania, or the region there- 
abouts. 

It does not seem proper to pass without notice the statement of Bona- 
fous, that the Treatise of Natural History, by Li-chi-tchin, written 
towards the middle of the sixteenth century, marks the existence of the 
maize in China; yet the fac simile of the ear from which this opinion is 
derived, does not show conclusively to our mind that it was not intended 
for a millet, but that it rather was, although we confess to a difficulty to 
account for the lines of the picture which perhaps represent silks. 

Very ill-grounded, also, seems the opinion of those who believe that 
they recognize maize in plants mentioned by Homer (53), as well as by 
Theophrastus (54), and those who lay stress upon the frequent allusions 
in the Bible to a product or plant translated corn (55). 

Let us summarize the opinions of authorities, first as to its eastern 
origin : Bock, 1532 ; Ruellius, 1536 ; Fuchsius, 1542 ; Sismondi, Michaud, 
Gregory, Lonicer, 1551 ; Amoreux, Regnier, Viterbo (Valcarcel), Douicer, 
Taberna-montanus, Bonafous, St. John, George de Turre, Daru, De 
Herbelot, Klippart. 

This is indeed a formidable list of learned men, and it therefore seems 
desirable to transcribe the definition of meliga ; upon the interpretation 
of which many of the above writers have founded their opinion. Accord- 

(49) Milman's Gibbons* Rome, Boston, 1850, v. 422-426. 

(50) Bibliotheque Orientale, 1778, iii, 137. (51) Agr. of O., 1858, 499. 
(52) Trans. N. Y. Agr. Soc, 1848, 680. (53) Odyssey, lib. iv, verses 41 and 604. 

(54) Historia Plantarura, lib. viii, c. 4. 

(55) 2d Kings, iv, 42 ; Job, xxiv, 24 ; Leviticus, ii, 14, and xxiii, 14 ; Deut. xxiii, 24 and 25 ; 
Gen. xU, 5 ; Matt. xii,l ; Kuth, ii, 14 ; Sam.,xvii, 28. See, also, Pliny, Nat. Hist., lib. xxvii, c. 7 ; 
also, Diodorus Siculus. 



1G 

ing to Klippart, Cardan, in the sixteenth century says that the wheat 
cultivated in the Western Indies, under the name of mais, approaches 
by its stature the plant designated in Italy by the name of melica or 
sorghum. Casper Bauhin, at about the same time, said that the Lom- 
bards named melaga, the plant known as saggina in Tuscany. Matthioli 
assures us that the plant known under the name of melega, was called 
melica in Lombardy ; saggina in Tuscany ; sorgho in many regions of 
Italy. George de Turre, an Italian botanist of the seventeenth century, 
says the maize or Turkish wheat imported into Italy a few years pre- 
viously, produced a stem similar to that of the plant named meliga or 
sorghum. The Academicians of Cuesca, whose 'authority bears a great 
weight in regard to language, render in their vocabulary the Italian 
word meliga (in Latin melica) by saggina. Targioni-Tozzetti, author of 
a botanical dictionary justly esteemed, translates the words holcus sorghum, 
L. by meliga, melica, melliga, miglio indiano, panico indiano. It is only in 
the Piedmontese dialect that the name melia or meligo is given both to 
the zea and holcus. 

The authors who ascribe to corn Zea Mays, L. an American origin 
are also numerous, and embraces the names of many individuals whose 
authority should have great weight : Dodonams, 1583 ; Camerarius, 
1588; Matthioli, Gerarde, Ray, Parmentier, Discourlitz, De Candolle, 
Humboldt, Darwin, F. Unger, Von Heer, De Jonnes, Targioni-Tozzetti, 
Hooker, Figuer, Thomas Nuttal, Mrs. Somerville, Flint, etc., and I 
believe that no candid and unprejudiced student can arrive at any 
other opinion at the present day. 

III. ORIGINAL VARIETIES. 

The varieties of maize are numberless, and we know of no adequate 
attempt to reduce them to a system whereby they may be intelligently 
classified and described. So uncertain are the majority of the descrip- 
tions in general use, that it seems impossible to identify varieties except 
by actual comparison with a typal specimen from the hands of the ori- 
ginator, or the first to apply the name. It is but through access to large 
collections, and by a careful study of the grain and its plants from every 
point of view, that success can be expected for any attempt to familiar- 
ize the differences which occur. It would be easy to prepare a long list 
of names, and to classify according to statements made, for this would 
but require access to files of seed catalogues, and a close poring over 
the columns of our agricultural press, but then when we had obtained 
this material, cui bono ? We shall hence content ourselves with reference 
to such few varieties of which we have an ascertained history, and 
which are asserted to have been derived from the Indians. 

There are said to be 130 varieties in Spain. Bonafous mention- 
ten varieties of white, twelve of yellow, one of red, and one vas 
riegated purple on a yellow ground. Heller describes shortly six 
varieties as among the best known in Mexico. Salisbury defines forty- 
four varieties, grouped after a certain form of arrangement. Bement 
six varieties of yellow and eleven of white. Klippart furnishes a de- 
scription of seventy-one varieties, and Burr of thirty-four. 

King Philip Corn. — So called after the celebrated Indian chief of the 
Wampanoags of that name, from which tribe the seed was obtained. 
It has been cultivated from times anterior to the landing of the Pilgrims. 
It is a hardy plant, with small stalks, and grows to about nine feet in 
height. The ears are eight-rowed, and from ten to fourteen inches 



IT 

long.(56) The improved King Philip or brown corn has the kernel cop- 
perred, rather large, somewhat broader than deep, smooth and glossy; 
cob small and pinkish white (57). 

Manila 1/ Corn. — Grown by the Mandan Indians on the Missouri river, 
as high ii}) as its source. It is Zea Mays, L. Var. Prcecox, NiM. Culm 
or stalk very short, spathes or husks arising from the base of the culm; 
seed mostly in eight rows. 

Pueblo Corn. — This is supposed by Dale to be the original corn of 
America, and is cultivated by the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico and 
Arizona. The grains vary in color through shades of pink, blue, and 
white, and the ears are generally rather small and slender. The blue 
variety is preferred for bread, and is sorted from the rest with much 
care and stored by itself. The ear has fourteen rows of grams, which 
are full and plump, and is six and three-quarter inches long, and four 
and three-quarter inches round (58). This variety is stated to bear a 
strong resemblance to that which is most common in the New England 
(States; the average height of the stalk is not more than six feet, and 
the ear is generally within one foot of the ground. The cob is large, 
writes Mr. Massie (59), but by way of compensation is unusually long. 
The grain is roundish, instead of long and flat, and the grain or head is 
in larger relative proportion to the rest of the grain, than is generally 
the case with the varieties produced in the States. The colors are blue, 
yellow, white, red, and even jet black. 

/Sioux Corn. — Also called Golden Sioux and Northern Flint corn, de- 
rived from the Sioux Indians in Canada. The cob is large, rather short, 
and bears twelve rows of moderate-sized grains (56). 

Squaw Corn. — Formerly cultivated by the Indians of Michigan. Ears 
eight-rowed, cylindrical, from four to eight inches long, and from one 
and a quarter to one and a half inches in diameter. Cob less firm than 
in some other varieties. 

Sweet Com. — This variety was introduced into Massachusetts in 1779, 
by Capt. Richard Bagnall, of Plymouth, from the country bordering on 
the Susquehanna, on his return from the expedition under the command 
of Gen. Sullivan against the tribes of the Six Nations. There are now 
varieties with a red cob and a white cob. The ears are short and usu- 
ally contain eight rows, the grains of which when mature are usually of 
a light color, and become shriveled when ripe (60). It is probable that 
this importation is not the original of all the varieties we at present 
possess, although it perhaps enters intoj the parentage of the majority 
of them. 

Tuscarora Corn. — This corn is thought to be the variety which was 
found in cultivation upon the settlement of North Carolina. When the 
Tuscarora Indians were removed to a reservation in Niagara county, 
N. Y., in 1712, they brought this seed-corn with them. It has long been 
cultivated by the Onondagas. It forms a large and tall plant. The 
ears contain from eight to twelve rows of grain, according to Salisbury, 
or from twelve to sixteen, according to Bement. The kernels are 
entirely destitute of a corneous covering, are said to be white or yellow 
in varieties, are sometimes slightly dented, as broad as long, and of very 
light weight, for corn. The cob is from seven to ten inches long, and of 
a light-red color (61). 

(56) Bement. Trans. N. Y. Ag. Soc. 1853,333. (57) Burr's Garden Vegetables, p. 173. 

(58) U. S. Dept. As. Kept. 1870, 420. (59) U.S. Pat Of. Kept. 1852-3,346. 

(60) Trans. N. Y. Ag. Soc. 1818, s;!6 ; 1853, 330, etc. The origin as stated may be questioned. 

(61) T P. Devereux, U. S. Pat. Of. Kept., 1849, 142. II. Powers, ib., 1853. 115. Salisbury, 
Trans. N. Y. Agr. Soc, 1848, 835. 

2 



18 

Wild Com. — Also called Oregon corn, California corn, etc., variously 
described. Klippart (62) says the cob does not exceed half an inch in 
diameter ; is very pithy ; the grains are each enveloped in a separate 
husk, and attached to the cob. The grain is very flinty, dented, rather 
ovate, sides convex, and pointed at. its place of insertion on the cob. 

Salisbury (63) says the wild corn, Rocky Mountain corn, Texan corn, 
forage corn, var. Ttmiuata, of which there are several sub-varieties, such 
as the white, the yellow, the red, and the purple. In all of these, each 
kind is enclosed in a husk, which by cultivation becomes shorter and 
shorter till it is scarcely perceptible. The kernel is generally small, 
deeper than wide, dented. Ears from six to twelve inches long. Plant 
under favorable circumstances large and stout, often from eight to ten 
feet tall. Mr. E. S. Carman writes : (65) "Wild California or Oregon 
corn, Rocky Mountain corn, Texas wild corn, cow corn — each kernel is 
enclosed in a distinct covering, the whole ear also being enveloped in a 
husk. These secondary husks, which inclose the kernels, are an inch or 
two in length at the base of the ear. The kernels in many of these are 
abortive, but higher up the husks or tunics gradually decrease in length, 
and as this takes place the kernels become fully developed until near 
the summit, the coverings scarcely enclosing them ; in fact, the terminal 
grains in some specimens protrude more or less. The grains are white, 
somewhat hard and flinty." Mr. Carman has known this variety to have 
been cultivated in the Western States for the past thirty years, without 
yet showing any great variation when planted at some distance from 
the naked-kernel sort. According to Professor Gray, the seeds of the 
Brazilian variety produce either common or husked maize. (66) This 
variety is figured in Bonafous' work, plate v, and by Lindley, as grain 
from North America, and in the Journal of the Horticultural Society, vol. 
1, 1846, p. 115.(67) 

Wyandotte Corn. — First introduced in 1853 by J. R. Thomas, of Waverly, 
111., who procured the seed from the Wyandotte Indians. It is pearl 
white, the meal white as flour, large grains shaped like the yellow flint, 
soft, twelve rowed, small cob twelve to fifteen inches long (68). Klippart 
(69) says this curiosity is unworthy of culture, on account of its lightness 
and lateness. It has many suckers, and all produce tassels and ears, 
and a single grain is sufficient for a hill. Each stalk may bear from four 
to eight ears, and each ear from eight to ten rows. 

Although botanists are now agreed that there is but one species of 
corn, yet some of the earlier writers separated Zea Mays, L., into a num- 
ber. Steudel, in his Synopsis Plantarum, furnishes seven : Zea Mays, L. 
Zea hirta, Bon., the hairy maize, having its leaves and husks hairy, and 
its spikelets sessile or seated close on the male flower, its leaves nearly 
parallel with the culm, pendulous; from California. Zea rostrata, Bon., 
spike elongated; seeds at the apex recurved, mucronate ; in Peru. Zea 
macrocarpa, Klotzsch, seeds compressed plane; albumen all farinaceous; 
in Peru. Zea curagua, Moliui ; culm low ; leaves serrate ; in Chili ; 
sometimes called stone maize. Zea cryptosperma, Bon. ; this is the 



(62) Agr. of O., 185S, 524. Figures given. (63) Trans. N. Y. Ag. Soc, 1848, 837. 

Ui5) Moore's Rural New Yorker, March 3, 1877. Figures given. The variety probably the 
same as figured in U. S. Pat. Of. Kept., 1853, 98. A colored kernel is figured in the frontispiece 
of this latter reference. 

(66) Darwin. An. and PI. under Domes, i, 386. 

(67) see also De Candolle, Geograph. Botanique, p. 951, and Teschemacher, in Proc. Boston 
Soc. of Nat. Hist., Oct. 19, 184i. 

(68) Agr. of Mass., 1858. 75. (69) Agr. of O., 1858, 517. 



•19 

covered maize, or wild corn ; in Buenos Ayres. Zea erythrolepsis, Bon., 
or red-husked corn, with grains compressed, glumes red. 

With but trilling exceptions, any specific distinction here afforded, 
may be found in a held of one variety of cultivated corn, as few plants 
are subject to wider variation of habit. 

IV. VARIATIONS. 

We shall here give an incomplete list of variations, using for illustra- 
tion, as far as may be, the varieties which have been described by 
authors, in preference to those in our own collection or our own obser- 
vation : 

1. Colors. 

Amber- colorei I Early sweet varieties. 

Semi-transparent, white Sweet varieties. 

Semi-transparent, yellowish.. Sweet varieties. 

Flesh-colored Eight and twelve-rowed flesh. Salisbury. 

White White-flint, White gourd seeds, etc. 

Dead-white Tuscarora. 

Yellowish white R. I. Asylum, early dwarf sugar. Burr. 

Tawny Smutty- white, of Cape Cod. 

Yellow Canada yellow, yellow dust, etc. 

Orange New England eight-rowed, in varieties. 

Red; Red pop, New Eng., 8-rowed red, Hematite. Salis- 

Dull red Master. Klippart. [bury. 

Red tinged Red blaze. Salisbury. 

Copper red King Philip. 

Purple Purple Wyandotte. Klippart. Red-kerneled rice. 

Blue Pinto. Heller. Omaha. Klippart, etc. [Bun: 

Dark brown Illinois brown. Klippart. 

Black Mexican. Flint. 

Slate black . Mexican sweet. Burr. 

Variegated Calico. Salisbury, and hybrids without number. 

2. Number of Rows of Grain in each Cob. 

8-rowed Golden sweet. Burr. Canada yellow. Burr. 

8 to 10-rowed Narragansett. Burr. Baden. Klippart. 

8 to 12-rowed Mexican flint, Klippart. 

10-rowed White pop. Klippart. Chinese tree. Bement. 

10 to 12-rowed.... Dalton. Burr. Yellow flint. Burr. 

10 to 14-rowed Early Adams. Klippart. Peabody's prolific. Klippart. 

10 to 16-rowed Wigwam. Klippat. 

12-rowed Golden Sioux. Bement. White [flint. Bement. 

12 to 14-rowed Red cob sweet. Burr. Bayou. Klippart. 

12 to 16-rowed Illinois yellow. Burr. Boniun. Klippart. 

12 to 18-rowed.... Stowell's evergreen. Klippart. 

14-rowed Trumbo. Klippart. 

14 to 24-rowed Wabash. Klippart. 

16 rowed White cap. Klippart. 

16 to 22-rowed.... White Horse-tooth. Burr. 

16 to 24-rowed ... . White gourd-seed. Klippart. 

16 to 26-rowed Tree corn. Klippart. 

18-rowed Gourd-seed. Klippart. Yankee. Klippart. 

18 to 32-rowed White gourd-seed. Burr. 

20-rowed Large white Tennessee. Klippart. Pennsylvania. Klippart 

24 to 26-rowed ... Large yellow gourd-seed. Salisbury. 

24 to 36-rowed . . . . Virginia white gourd-seed. Bement. 

We also find statements of forty and forty-eight rows of grain for 
single ears. (70) 

(70) U. 8. Pat. Office Rept., 1847, p. 131. 



20 

3. Maxima and Minima. 

The largest cob we have seen was one exhibited at the Centennial Ex- 
hibition at Philadelphia, which was, when dry, fourteen and a half 
inches ; this was an eight-rowed variety. We find record for maxima : 
ears twelve to thirteen inches in circumferences and from twelve to four- 
teen inches long ; another ear twelve inches long, nearly ten inches in 
circumference and bearing 1,446 kernels, three-quarters of an inch in 
length ; another ear mentioned as containing 1,006 kernels, and being 
sixteen inches in length. 

The smallest ears we have seen have been one inch long. Mr. J. B. 
Walker, Concord, N. H., has a variety of pop-corn from Vermont, which 
bears, as a crop, ears only from one and a half to two inches long. 

As to the size of the kernels, we have noted in one small collection a 
range in weight as six to one, as between the Benton corn, from Con- 
necticut, and an ordinary golden pop-corn ; Darwin, in a small collection, 
found a difference by weight between kernels of two varieties as seven 
to one. 

4. Variation in Color of Cob and Grain (71). 

White cob and White kernels White Flint. 

Flesh-colored kernels. ..8-rowed flesh. 

Red tinged kernels Red blaze. 

Red kernels 8-rowed New England red. 

Blue kernels Blue pop. 

Black kernels Mexican sweet. 

Yellow kernels Canada yellow. 

Variegated kernels Calico. 

Red cob and White kernels White Virginia Gourd Seed. 

Yellow kernels Ohio Dent. 

Red kernels Red pop. 

Red and white cob and White kernels Early white. Kiippart. 

White and red cob and White kernels Hackberry white. Kiippart. 

Pinkish white cob and White kernels Tuscarora. Barr. 

5. Variations in Maturity. 

Parmentier mentions a corn in Hungary which ripens in sixty days, 
but we are rather distrustful of our quotation ; a variety in the 
Ionian Isles, called cinquantino, is said to ripen in fifty days. (71 ) 
. Salisbury gives ninety days for the small yellow pop corn, and 135 
to 150 days for the Pennsylvania dent. Flint says the Canada corn 
ripens in 100 days from planting ; the Rocky Mountain corn in 140 days ; 
the range in the United States seems from 100 to 200 days. (72) Darwin 
from his authorities, states as the limits, three or four months for the 
dwarf kinds, and six or seven months for the taller varieties. 

6. Variations in Growth. 
Flint mentions corn in Tennessee, when the plant averaged in fields 
sixteen to eighteen feet high, and exceptional stalks measured twenty- 
two feet three inches long.(73) John J. Thomas states that this plant 
has been known to attain the height of thirty feet in the West Indies. (74) 
Morelet says of Central America :(74') " Our eyes wandered over undu- 
lating expanses covered with maize, the stalks of which here often reach 
the height of from seven to eight yards. We carefully noted the stalks 

(71) Except as noted, the authority is Salisbury. (71') U. S. Pat. Of. Kept , 1S59, p. 121. 

(72) U. S. Pat. Of. Kept. 1848, pp. 652-655. (73) Ayr. of Mass. 1858, p. 71. 
(74) Trans. N. Y. Agr. Soc. 1843, p. 181. (74') Trav.,p. 226. 



21 

of corn exhibited at, the Centennial, and although we did not actually 
measure any specimen, yet we are quite confident that some exceeded 
fifteen or sixteen feet in height ; the tallest we have actually measured 
has been fourteen feet ten inches. Bonaf'ous(75) describes a dwarf 
variety sixteen to eighteen inches tall. We have never seen a variety 
growing in fertile soil which was under four feet, yet individual 
hills, on sterile laud, may show a much smaller growth. In the 
twenty varieties grown side by side by Salisbury, all planted on 
the same date, one variety the small eight-rowed Canada began to 
flower July 10, while the latest flowering variety was the Rocky Moun- 
tain corn, Augast 10, a variation of one month ; the tallest plant was the 
large white flint, ten feet six inches ; the shortest growth, the squaw 
corn five feet ten inches. (76) The height which a corn plant may 
assume, depends largely upon the closeness of planting and the fertility 
of the soil ; a nitrogenous manure and close planting tending to elongate 
the nodes, and thus to lengthen the plant over what it might otherwise 
have measured. In some varieties, we have naturally a more elongated 
node than in others ; and hence we have a different appearance to the 
leafing. Some varieties, like the Wyandotte, are disposed to sucker 
greatly ;. other varieties show but a feeble tendency to increase their 
stalks in this manner. Some varieties bear their ears high up, others 
low down on the stalk. Some varieties normally show a tendency 
to bear several ears to a stalk, others but, one ear, aud still others are so 
feebly prolific that many stalks show no ear whatsoever. We have 
counted nine ears to a stalk, have found record(77) of a stalk having 
been exhibited at an agricultural fair, which had twelve ears, and 
have been told of fourteen to a stalk. Some varieties bear a terminal 
ear on a branch, other varieties bear the ear axillary, and exception- 
ally a branch may occur with several axillary as well as a terminal 
ear. Some varieties bear their ears on determinate nodes, so much so, 
that this habit seems strongly characteristic. 

7. Variations from Climate. 
It is a common observation among farmers that, corn changes its 
character when removed from one locality to another. Thus Canada 
corn removed to New Hampshire or Massachusetts shows a marked ten- 
dency towards lengthening of the ears, often towards a change from a 
strictly 8-rowed variety to one containing many ten aud twelve-rowed 
ears, and a stronger and taller growth of plant. Southern corn moved 
north is said to grow smaller. Flint corn, removed from the hill fields 
to intervales, to assume a deut character, or even, in cases, to be entirely 
changed, and vice versa for the gourd-seed varieties, which tend contrari- 
wise, towards the flinty habit. No corn, unless restrained within its 
type through the exercise of the art of selection, can maintain its original 
character when removed to regions where it meets with a different set 
of adaptations to be overcome. The corn-plant is, however, so subject 
to change through cross-pollenation, that it is difficult to study the in- 
fluence of climate on its growth, for oftentimes we must believe that the 
change of a variety into another analogous to that, cultivated about it, is 
often due to unnoticed pollenation by the variety predominant in the 
vicinity (78). 

(75) Nat. Hist, ilu mais. See Scientific Farmer, Aug., 1878, p. 117 

(76) Trans. N. V. Agr. Soc. L848, \>\> 766-769. (77) U. S Pat, Of Kept. 1847, p. 131. 
(78) For references see U. S Pat. Of. Reports, 1849-50, 124, L42, 169, 17.",, ls_>, 224,226 ; ib., 1850-1, 

371 ; ib., 1848, 135 ; ib., 1847, 391 ; U. S. Depi. Agr. Kepi.. 1862, 229, etc. 



22 

8. Hybridizing. 

By this term we mean the cross-fertilization, or the influence of pollen 
from one variety acting upon the ovule of another, and not the crossing 
of distinct species, as would be inferred from the accurate meaning of 
the word "hybridize" — i. e,, the crossing of species. As the influence of 
pollenation as changing the character of the fertilized ovule is not clearly 
recognized by scientific writers, we shall devote a little space to this 
branch of our subject. 

Thus Gaertner(79) affirms that the pea seems an exceptional plant, as 
being influenced in its color by the pollen from another variety, and dis- 
tinctly states that the white dwarf variety of corn, when inoculated with 
the large, red-striped form, produces seeds which exhibit no change of 
color, though when sown they give rise to variegated spikes. Darwin (80) 
says distinctly that the pollen of one species or variety, when applied to 
a distinct form, occasionally causes the coats of the seeds and the ova- 
rium or fruit, including even, in an instance, the calx and upper part of 
the peduncle of the mother plant, to become modified. Sometimes the 
whole of the ovarium or all the seeds are thus affected; sometimes only 
a certain number of the seeds, as in the pea, or only a part of the ova- 
rium, as with the striped orange, mottled grapes, and maize are thus 
affected. He again writes (81) that when peas of one color are artificially 
fertilized by pollen from a variety of another color, peas of the two colcrs 
may appear in the produced pod. This has been proved by Gaertner 
and Berkeley, so far as the influence of the pollenation on trie skin of the 
pea, etc. Gallesio fertilized the flowers of an orange with pollen from the 
lemon, and we find those produced bore a longitudinal stripe of peel 
having the color, flavor and other characters of the lemon. 

We might offer other instances which we have met with, but as Dar- 
win, with a far superior knowledge of the credibility of authorities, has 
quite fully treated this subject, we may conclude that the present state 
of science credits the influence of the pollenation in modifying the seed 
to be limited to the skin or outer coating alone. As this is not in accord- 
ance with the facts as we have observed them, we proceed to give the 
result of our own observation. 

The silk, succulent and translucent, emerges from the sheath, and 
evidently remains in this condition for a considerable period, even two 
or three days, or even longer, if pollenation is not effected ; so soon, 
however, as the pollen gains access, it turns brownish and dies at the 
extremities ; and, under favorable conditions, this change need not 
occupy more than a day. By removing the silks under the microscope, 
and brushing them with the pollen, these minute grains were observed 
to adhere, and after a time to change their shape and become wrinkled, 
yet but slightly, and to send out a tubular prolongation. When numer- 
ous grains were lodged on the silk under examination, in a few hours 
the texture of the silk became changed, showing less transparent and 
certain other differences difficult to be expressed. This is in harmony 
with the description of the action of pollenation as given by Thome, 
but I was unable to detect the whole process. He says (82): "When 
pollenation has been fully accomplished, the pollen grain, excited by the 
viscid fluid exuded by the stigma, puts out one or more long tubes, the 



(79) Journal Horticultural Society, London, 1850, 165. 

(SO) An. ami PI. under Domes. i, -18-2. (81) Ih., i, 4'29. 

(82) Text-book of Struct, and Phys. Bot. By Otto W. Thome. Translated by A W. Ben- 
nett. New York, l.sTtf, p. 187. 



pollen-tubes, which are unicellular and usually simple. These pene- 
trate through the conducting tissue of the style, and reach the interior 
of the cavity of the ovary in a few hours; in the case of Colchicum in 
about twelve. Then they come into contact with t\\e ovules and attach 
themselves closely to them," etc. When we consider the size of the 
pollen grain of corn (about one-three-hundredth of an inch in diameter) 
and the length of the silks (occasionally eighteen inches or more for the 
butt grains), we must believe that the pollen tube elongates by the 
absorption of nutriment from the cells of the silk. We have proven 
that the stigmatic surfaces of the silk extend quite a distance from their 
extremity, for several ears of sweet corn were opened by us, the extremities 
of the silks all removed with a knife, and yet the silks elongated and 
received the pollen, and the kernels all developed with the exception of 
a few at and about the top of the cob. 

Now, when a kernel fails to become fertilized, there is an influence 
exerted on the cob, for when the central portion of the cob fails to 
become fertilized as to its grain, the cob shrivels at this point very 
greatly, and becomes hard and woody, while the cob under the fertilized 
portions is pithy and cellular and succulent ; indeed, in these cases we 
find the cob at either extremity of the ear normally deve oped, but the 
intervening portion of small diameter, and of an obviously different 
nature. We here have the effect of cross-breeding exercised on that 
portion of the plant which bears the grain ! Indeed, the same fact is 
illustrated in those more frequent cases when some few only of the ovules 
of the cob'receive*pollen. What adifference at hai-vest between the flexible, 
flimsy, unfertilized cob, and the rotund, hard and tough cob which is stud- 
ded so abundantly with grain. This action of the pollen probably 
affects the habit of growth of the whole plant, for the trained eye can 
determine at a distance with considerable certainty, as we have many 
times proven to doubters, the ear-bearing aud the non-ear-beariug stalks, 
which occur in fields which we have studied. 

Professor Beal states (83) that the different kinds on the same ear may 
have twenty or more different parents. He shows some ears where 
sweet corn and pop corn had been planted near each other, where the 
color, size and texture of some of the kernels had been changed. We 
have seen an hybrid corn made up of five distinct varieties ; we have 
observed yellow corn, white corn, flint corn, dented corn, red corn, and 
sweet corn kernels occupying the same ear, sometimes two varieties only, 
sometimes three, sometimes all, and we see no reason why if twenty 
distinct varieties of a similar flowering period were planted together,, 
we should not recognize all the twenty on some ears of the crop of the 
same year. 

We have noted, as an effect of cross-pollenation, a change of color, a 
change of shape, aiid a change of quality. Not only is the change not 
confined to the skin, the episperm or testa, but extends to the albumen 
or endosperm, and even to the chit, the embryo, or germ. If the grain 
of a pop corn, a flint corn, a dent corn, and a Tuscarora corn, be split, 
there will be seen three arrangements (two in the Tuscarora) composing 
the chit, the white, starchy portion, and the corneous portion, each well 
defined and bearing different relations to each other. If the cross-bred 
corn of these varieties, all grown on the same cob, but with their pecu- 
liar male parent, be examined, they will be sure to present these same 



(83) Mich. Board of Agr. Kept. 137G. -21-2. 



24 

differences, each according to their outward change. The pop corn will 
show its visible oil or corneous portion, extending even to the chit, and 
will pop ; while its neighbor, a flint corn, will show a broad, white, 
starchy portion between the chit and the corneous portion, and will not 
pop, etc. Indeed, the chits even will show each a difference, and will 
appear allied to the variety whose form they have assumed. If the corn 
grains are split and treated with chemical solutions, sulphate of copper, 
will produce a green coloring to the chit, and iodine a violet coloring to 
the starch, while the corneous portion will retain its proper color. We 
hence have defined, not the absolute presence or absence of oil, etc., from 
the colored portions, etc., but a strictly defined division of physical 
arrangement, which differs in relative size with the varieties and in the 
manner of its arrangement. 

In the forming of varieties, this cross-fertilization bears a large part. 
Thus, the difficulty of maintaining more than one variety on the farm, 
unless the blooming period be different. We qnote from Burr, that the 
golden sugar corn is the result of a cross between the Canada, a flint 
corn, and Darlings Early, a sweet corn ; that the Old Colony Sweet was 
formed from the Southern White and the* con mon swe^t corn of New 
England, but when these hybrid varieties are formed, it requires a long 
series of selections to iix the new type, and to prevent its occasionally 
reverting to one or the other of its ancestors. 

These eight headings, under variations, are but shortly treated, and 
are designed to illustrate the difficulty which must attend a botanical 
history of corn, as well as to give impress to a few facfs of general con- 
cern. They have a connection with our subject as formulating some of 
the facts which must be used in the effort to trace corn to its origin 
through its variations ; a task by no means hopeless, yet one which shall 
require the deepest study and the most pains-taking investigation. It 
ha<) been our intention to have attempted the tracing of climatic varia- 
tion and its correlative effect upon the distribution of this cereal, but we 
find the data we have collected as yet insufficient. We will but say that 
variation can be brought about and fixed, by means of which the culture 
of corn can be constantly extended beyond its present limits, as is shown 
by its wide range of adaptations, and its pliability in the hands of man ; 
and that this same variation can be used to greatly extend its cropping 
capacity through inheritance guided by the intelligent mind. 

V. INDIAN CULTIVATION. 

Among the aborigines, as in many, if ifot all the uncivilized tribes of 
the world, the care of the fields was consigned to the females of the 
tribe, and Schoolcraft mentions that among our Indians the corn-plant- 
ing and the corn-gathering was done by the women and children, aided 
by a few of the superannuated old men. This was not considered a 
hardship, but rather, in their view, an equivalent for the onerous and 
continuous labor of the men in the chase and in war. They held many 
superstitions concerning the corn crop, and merriments connected with 
the joyful season of harvest, which even now are not unknown in rural 
neighborhoods. " If one of the young female buskers finds a red ear of 
corn, it is typical of a brave admirer, and is regarded as a fitting present to 
some young warrior." Compare this with the practice even now in vogue 
in our farming districts, where the finder of the red ear is entitled to 
give or receive a kiss. Curiously enough, the present mode of culture 



25 

differs but slightly from that culture taught by the Indians to the colo- 
nists at Jamestown in 1007. 

The Indian method was laborious, as would be expected when tools, 
save those rude ones made from the sliver of wood, or of a clam shell, or a 
flat stone, were unknown. A space was first cleared, in New England, 
and along the coast, by burning the dead wood ; the debris was then col- 
lected into piles, which were again treated with lire ; and thus, through 
perseverance and toil, a free space was gained from the forest. The 
Indians of the coast understood the value of manure, for they would 
bring sticks to the cleared land to be burned, and often er added a fish 
from the sea, a sucker from the stream, or a horse-shoe crab from the 
beach, to each hill. These coast Indians then dig holes about four feet 
apart, using a rude hoe formed from a clam shell, or of the flat shoulder- 
blade of the moose, or of a crooked piece of wood. Into these holes the 
fish were dropped and covered, and then about half a dozen kernels of 
corn. They then carefully protected the field from the ravages of birds 
and vermin, and as the corn grew the earth was laboriously scraped up 
around the stalks with clam shells until each hill was about two feet 
high. (84) The Sieur de Champlain, in 1005, touched at the mouth of 
the Kennebec river. In his journals, he says : " Here we saw Indian 
corn, which they sow three or four grains in a place, covering them with 
earth ; at a distance of three feet plant as much more, and so on. They 
plant their corn in May and gather it in September." At the Saco river : 
" The savages told us that all who inhabited this region cultivated and 
sowed the land like those we had seen." At Cape Cod, July 21st : " We 
landed, and passed through a field of corn, planted like those we had 
seen before; The corn was in blossom, and about five and a half feet 
high. * * * There were also several fields not cultivated, being left 
to recruit in fallow," etc. • 

In New York State, an old Oneida Indian stated to Mr. Schoolcraft, 
that " in ancient times the corn hills were made so large that three clus- 
ters of stalks were raised on each hill, and that the hill once prepared 
was used year after year, causing them to be kept large, and account- 
ing for their distinct continuance to this day." 

In Minnesota, in 1819-20, the Sioux Indians planted the corn in hills 
raised from eight to twelve inches high, the top leveled to the size of six 
or eight inches in diameter, and made by means of a hoe purchased of 
the traders, or the branch of a tree sharpened. (85) 

In the dry regions of the southwest, where it would seem that a crop 
could only be grown by irrigation, the Navajos have a peculiar custom, 
whereby moisture is conserved for the young plant until it passes through 
the germinating period. The roots are placed far below the dry surface, 
and in the region of moisture, by forming holes twelve or eighteen inches 
deep by means of sharpened stakes which are driven into the ground to 
form the planting places. One or more kernels of corn, previously envel- 
oped in a ball of mud about the size of the fist, are dropped into these 
holes, and covered with liyht earth to the depth of two or three inches. 
As the moisture of the mud brings about germination, the roots extend 
immediately into the moistened lower strata of the soil, and thus this 
method seems to provide a crop when corn planted in the ordinary way, 
near the surface, would perish. 

(84) Champlain 's Voyage. Prince Soc. Ed., 121, 64. Wood's New Eng. Prospects; 1st ed., 81, 
etc. This description applies also to Virginia, see Capt. John Smith's account of the Indians of 
Virginia. 

(85) P Prescott, U. S. Pat. Of. Kept., 1819-50, 451. 



26 

VI. PRODUCTS. 

The Indians and natives of the countries where it occurred, eat it green 
and roasted or boiled ; also, the dry grain boiled (the prototype of our 
hulled corn), parched or bruised into a flour of which various kinds of 
bread were made. They also made an intoxicating drink from the grain, 
and extracted the oil, which served them as a butter. Mr. Winthrop 
says the Indians made samp from it. The Peruvians made vinegar. 
At the present time, the grain enters largely into consumption as food 
for animals, either ground or whole. It is also extensively used in the 
form of meal in our families, and occurs also prepared in numerous ways. 
Thus: whole, as hulled corn ; cracked and broken, as varieties of prepa- 
rations known as samp, hominy, etc. ; ground and specially treated, as 
maizena, farina, corn-starch, etc., which are served in the form of pud- 
dings on our tables ; and but few of us but are familiar with its prepara- 
tions uudei 1 the name of hasty pudding, johnny-cake, hoe-cake, 
mush, corn-cakes, cjrn-bread, Indian pudding, hominy, succotash, 
etc.. The grain is also used largely for the manufacture of 
whisky. Glucose has also been made from it by treating corn-starch 
with sulphuric acid. The green corn is a favorite vegetable, as we all 
know, and the business of canning for winter use employs a large capital. 

The stalks furnished a kind of honey to the Peruvians, from its juice, 
and to the Mexicans a kind of sugar. During the Revolutionary War, 
it was quite common for our farmers to procure from this source their 
family stock of molasses. In the New York Agricultural Society's 
Transactions for 1843, will be found an account of sugar-making on quite 
a large experimental scale. The stalks also furnish an excellent fodder 
for cattle when well cured, being worth for feeding purposes from one- 
half to three-fifths the value of good hay. Fodder corn, or the stalks cut 
greeu, is a well-known and appreciated cattle food, largely grown to sup- 
plement the pasturage during the month of drought. 

The husks are used in the domestic manufacture of mats, being first 
soaked and then twisted and braided. The inner husks will make a 
beautiful writing paper, and a greyish paper can be made from all parts 
of the plant. Cobbett published a book on corn printed on paper made 
from the plant. The husks also find use as' a stuffing for mattresses. 
Experimentally, they have been successfully used for making a textile 
fabric, a sort of crash. (86) 

Filially, the pith ma-y be used for cleaning metal, as the threads of 
fine screws; the cob furnishes a good kindling; an excollent dye has 
been extracted from the grain. 

VII. POSTSCRIPT. 

Classification of Varieties. 
As a prelude to a careful- investigation into the history of the distribu- 
tion, habits and variations of the corn plant, it seems necessary to devise 
a scheme for the classification of varieties. No satisfactory one has yet, 
so far as we are aware, been proposed, and it is probable that our 
knowledge of the corn plant is not as yet sufficient to admit of 
a natural classification. Bonafous attempted to do it by color, but this 
is entirely unsatisfactory. Flint makes no real attempt. Salisbury suc- 
ceeds to a certain extent, but his scheme is quite faulty as based on the 

(SO) U. S. Dept. Ag. Kept, 1S63, 436. 



27 

characters of the sted alone, not on the ear, and upon characters which 
are exceedingly changeable. His grouping is as below : 

1. Those the kernels of which have a corneous portion, and are rather 
shriveled or indented. 

2. Those the kernels of which are destitute of a corneous portion, and 
are rather shriveled or indented. 

8. Those the kernels of which have a corneous development on their 
sides, and a dent or degression on their crowns. 

4. Those the kernels of which are destitute of a corneous portion and 
shrink or contract at maturity, giving a shriveled appearance to the 
epidermis. 

5. Those the kernels of which are destitute of a farinaceous portion, and 
at maturity shrink or contract, giving a shriveled appearance to the 
epidermis. 

6. Those with each ke*rnel inclosed in a husk or spalter-like envelope, 
aside from the general covering of the ear. 

Under these divisions he forms classes based on the color of the ker- 
nels and the cob, and within these classes are placed the varieties or 
kinds which have the ear and grain specifically described. 

Klippart attempts a division into hard and soft corn, but does not 
make a success of it. Flagg forms five divisions, according to uses, the 
most artificial arrangement possible. Thus : 

f. Feeding corn, comprising the dent and gourd-seed corn, preferable 
for its softness. 

2. Meal or flour corn, comprising the hard or flint corn, which is too 
hard for profitable feeding, but keeps better when ground. 

3. Roasting ear corn, embracing the sweet and sugar corn. 

4. Pop corn. 

5. Fancy varieties, such as those cultivated for ornament or curiosity, 
that have no particular value for any useful purpose, such as the Japan- 
ese maize. 

We are fully aware of the difficulty in classifying the varieties of corn, 
and the provisional arrangement we would suggest is partly artificial, 
partly a natural system. Yet it seems necessary that there should be 
some scheme devised by which varieties can be identified so as to 
admit of ready recognition, in order that their affinities and varieties 
may be noted in an understanding manner. 

Every one knows that there are four kinds of corn — the pop corn, the 
flint corn, the sweet corn, and the dent corn ; and this is equivalent to 
saying that there are structural differences which may be seen between 
the ears of these kinds. Every one knows that ears of corn of these 
varieties present differences which are readily recognized, and that 
there are apparently closer affinities between the pop corn and the flint 
corn than between flint corn and the true dents. So in the growth of 
the plants under culture we recognize a certain variation which exists 
between varieties, the pop corns being dwarf, the dents being tall-grow- 
ing plants ; certain sweet corns producing their ears of crop at the 
lower nodes, and certain others at higher nodes, etc. It is not as well 
known that the numbor of nodes on varieties may vary, and that they 
seem quite constant in certain varieties. 

If we break the ears in two at the middle portion, and observe the 
shape of the grains and the cob, at the section of the fracture, we will 
have suggested to us four separate types of arrangement on the cob, 
thus : 



28 

A. Grains of a rounded surface, forming an undulating outline. This 
division includes the pop corns, the flint corns, the Canada corns, and 
the Tuscarora corn, and perhaps others. 

B. Grains of a flattened surface, the broken ear showing a rounded out- 
line. This division includes the dent corns, sweet corns, and possibly 
others. 

C. Grains so formed as to leave a triangular sulcus or furrow between the 
rows. This division takes in the Tennessee prolific corn, and perhaps 
others. 

D. Grains partially or completely enveloped in bracts, as the wild corn, 
so called. 

These four groups, A, B, C, D, are natural groupings, which every one 
familiar with corn collections will immediately recognize. The Yankee 
expresses the groups under A and B, the only two with which he is 
familiar, as Eastern and Western corn, and also locally as field corn and 
sweet corn ; and every variety we have seen can readily be assigned to 
the one or the other of these groups. 

Under A, Grains of a rounded surface, we can subdivide into a, pop 
corns, b, the flint corns, c, exceptional corns of peculiar character : a, or 
pop corns, are distinguished by their exploding, when brought gradually 
to a certain temperature, into a larjje, pure-white, starchy, elastic mass. 
This is brought about through the distribution of the oil throughout 
their substance, so that when the oil vaporizes it everts all portions. If 
a pop corn be split, the corneous portion will be seen in some varieties 
to extend almost or quite to the chit ; in other varieties there will be a 
shallow farinaceous portion between the chit and the thick corneous 
envelopes, and thus the structure carries the pop corn close to b, the flint 
corns, which have a corneous envelope about the grain, and a large fari- 
naceous portion between this covering and the chit. The Tuscarora 
corn, which comes under our division c, has a rounded kernel, is allied 
in external arrangement to the pop and flint corns, but structurally 
varies in having no corneous coating, but in the farina extending from 
the chit to the outer coating or epidermis. 

Under B, grains of a flattened surface, we can subdivide into(#) sweet 
corn and {y) field corn. Sweet corns (x) are distinguished by their 
wrinkled kernel, and the corneous portion constituting the bulk of the 
seed. Field corns (y) are distinguished by the summit of the grain 
being destitute of a corneous covering, and hence becoming dented as the 
grain dries in ripening. 

A further subdivision under each section may be made, based on 
color of kernel, color of cob, number of rows, shape of kernel, etc. 

It would be presumptuous in us to claim that these divisions we have 
offered will include every variety. We can only say that they include 
every variety we have as yet seen, and seem to be based, in their typi- 
cal specimens at least, on natural and easily recognized systems. This 
arrangement of ours can be arranged in a form comparable with the 
botanical system, as below : 



29 



\ UBIETIES. 



A. Grains of a rounded surface 
forming an undulatory out- 
line to the ear in eros8-sec- 
tion 



B. Grains of flattened surface or 
lilling a circular outline in 
cross-section of ear 



a. Pop corns. . 



b. Flint Corns 



(x. Sweet Corn. 



y. Field Corn . 



1. Parching corn. . 

2. Kice corn, etc. . 

1. Canada corn. . . . 
•2. White Flint .... 

1. Evergreen 

2. Mexican, etc 

1. Iowa dent 

2. Baden, etc 



| 1. While. 

I 2. Fellow, etc. 

t i. While rice. 

\2. Yellow rice, etc. 

I l VTanshakum corn. 
( 2. DaJton corn, eic 

! 1. abode Inland White 

< Cap. 

( ■.!. Long- white, etc. 



I have insufficient material to fill out c and d, and therefore shall not 
attempt it. This scheme is sufficiently elastic to receive all known varie- 
ties, I think, and to enable an unknown species described in accordance 
with this system to be quickly identified. It also seems to provide a 
place for the many varieties which are produced through hybridization 
and selection, because it seems to bring allied forms together, as well as 
those which are more readily convertible, the one type into another. I 
present it with diffidence, however, as I have had no opportunity to test 
its value in the study of large collections of corn from diverse regions. 

Postscript II. 

Since the above was in type, we find other information which adds 
somewhat to our history of corn : 

New Haven, April 18, 1879. 
My dear Dr. Sturtevant : 

You ask for notes relating to the History of the corn plant. I have 
among my books old Kybers' Botany, 1552 [Hieronymi Tragi, de 
stirpium Maxima? Earum qua? in Germania nostra nascentur * * * 
intrepreto Davide Kybers ArgentinenseJ. (Hieronymus Bock (or Tragus 
as he wrote it), one of the earliest writers on German plants, born 1498, 
was a teacher, director of the Royal Gardens, etc., died 1554. He 
published in German, in 1539, without illustrations ; then in 1551 a new 
edition. This is Kybers' translation into Latin; the wood-cuts in this 
translation were designed for the edition of 1551. So this brings back 
the date a little), in Latin, with figures and description of maize (the 
earliest figures I am familiar with), under the name of Turkish Kom, 
the name it still has in Germany. (Everything foreign or barbarous 
was Turkish in the Middle Ages.) 

Also Gerarde's Herbal (in English), Ed. 1597, the many figures of corn 
uncolored. I have seen colored figures showing red, white, yellow, 
spotted, and blue grains even then. 

Also, old Hernandez Natural History of Mexico [Nova Plantarum, 
Animalium et Mineralium Mexicanorum Historia a Francesco Her- 
nandez, * * * Rome, 1651] ; was sent by Philip II. to Mexico, 
where he remained 1591-1600. His first edition, published in Spanish, 
in Mexico, in 1615. There is not a complete copy of this to be found 
now in Europe. 

He brought back seventeen volumes of drawings and manuscripts, 
twelve of which were burned in Spain ; and this Latin edition is of 



30 

what was left, brought out in Rome first in folio in 1628, then in 4to in 
1651. It is probable, therefore, that the text describes the condition of 
maize, its cultivated variety as it was in Mexico before 1600; the 4to 
edition, Rome, 1651, with figures and long Latin description. 

This is important on some accounts, because he was a great student 
and his work a great one. * * * 

The following notes from Bretschneider may interest you : — 

Dr. E. Bretschneider, physician of the Russian Legation at Peking, 
published at Foochoo, in 1870, a pamphlet " On the Study and Value of 
Chinese Botanical Works, with notes on the History of Plants and 
Geographical Botany from Chiuese Sources." 

He had made a special study of this. He says (p. 7 of his pamphlet), 
" In the same manner it can be proved, from Chinese sources, that 
maize and tobacco are not indigenous in China." 

On page 18 he goes into this more fully, with the Chinese characters 
involved, etc. : — 

" I, have .already stated that the maize, a native of America, has been 
introduced into China. Li-shi-chen was the first Chinese author who 
mentioned it, at the close of the sixteenth century, under the name of 
[my notes in these [] braces. — W. H. B.] [Gives the Chinese characters] 
Yii-shu-shu (Jade Sorgho) ; " [then he gives references]. He states that 
it was introduced from Central Asia. " Nowadays it is largely culti- 
vated in China, and bears in each province a different name [more 
referencesj. The Persian name of maize is Ghendum i Mekka (wheat 
from Mecca), that seems to prove that maize, after being brought from 
Europe, spread over Asia from west to east. * * * At Peking, maize 
is called [gives the Chinese characters] Yii-mi (Jade Corn.) * * * 
Maize is abundantly cultivated in the neighborhood of Peking, and 
the bread baked from maize forms one of the cheapest articles of food of 
the poor. [In a foot-note he says that maize is so cheap in Peking that 
even beggars enjoy, from time to time, the luxury of eating maize- 
bread ; the usual food of beggars in China being such as dogs eat, often 
collected in the streets where it had been thrown.] [He then says that 
he had inquired of old men in Peking, all of whom said that maize had 
been cultivated there as long as they knew anything about it.] ' More- 
over, a learned Chinese assured me that the cultivation of maize near 
Peking dates from the end of the Ming Dynasty, 1380-1644.' " 

In the author's " list of Chinese works," quoted in the foregoing notes, 
sixty-one are cited; of the works written before the third century B.C., 
there are eight. 

To return to Hernandez. While I think it is abundantly proved that 
the plant was cultivated in America at the time of the discovery, I think 
it as abundantly proved that it was unknown in the Old World. 
(That is why I have quoted Bretschneider so fully, for those who as- 
cribe an Oriental origin usually refer to the Chinese.) Hernandez, in 
his time, thought it American. He says even the barbarous tribes 
knew it. * * * * I write this in response to your note, page 56 
of the /Scientific Farmer. 

Yours truly, 

WM. H. BREWER. 

P. S. — I used to think maize, like some other plants, might belong to 
both the Old and New World. Now I do not think so. 

In 1869, 1 met a Mr. Roezl, a German, with some considerable botanical 
knowledge, who had spent sixteen years in Mexico, and had botanized 



31 

there somewhat extensively. I asked him if he had ever seen Zea Mays 
wild there. He had not, and doubted if it was found in Mexico; but, 
what was interesting to me, he found in the State of Guerero a Zea 
which he thinks specifically distinct, and he thinks undescribed; the 
ears very small, in two rows "truly distichous"; the ear (but not each 
grain separately) covered with a husk, the grain precisely like some 
varieties of maize, only smaller arid harder. If this statement be true, 
and it was made very positively, it is the only wild Zea I know of, and 
the only wild plant that may be a possible progenitor of the cultivated 
maize. 

Other material for history can be found in nearly all the early voyager's 
relations. In De Soto's march of invasion, rnaes is continually mentioned 
as cultivated in quantity, and is said to resemble millet. In the un- 
fortunate expedition of Narvaez, still earlier, Carbeca de Vega, found 
it generally cultivated even into the arid regions of New Mexico(P), 
Texas, Mexico, etc. In Brazil, in 1647, Nieuhoff speaks of it as "Turkey 
wheat," called maiz by the Indians, etc. In Jamaica,. Lunan confounds 
it with Guinea corn. In 1665, white and red varieties were " in good 
plenty," about Batavia. We have it from good testimony that fossil 
corn has been found in Texas, the grains resembling our modern 
varieties. In the Illinois Hort. Soc. Trans., 1876, it is asserted by a 
Mr. Spitz, that he had found in working a stone quarry near La Prairie, 
Adams county, 111., both stalks and ears of corn of full size and perfect 
in appearance, in a petrified condition, and imbedded in a strata of sand- 
stone four feet in thickness, and that it was just like our Indian corn, 
etc. In Illinois, corn is mentioned by Marquette in 1673; Allouez in 
1676; and Membre in 1679, as cultivated by the Indians. In 1553, Peter 
Cieca, in his "Chronicle," speaks of maize being cultivated about Quito, 
Peru. 



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